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don't count your chickens before they've hatched

don't count your chickens before they've hatched is the alternative form of don't count your chickens before they're hatched.

Meaning of don't count your chickens before they're hatched

Proverb

don't count your chickens before they're hatched

  1. One should not depend upon a favorable (and typically overoptimistic) outcome to one's plans until it is certain to occur.
    • [...] Make Fools believe in their fore-seeing / Of things before they are in Being; / To swallow Gudgeons ere th' are catch'd, / And count their Chickens ere th' are hatch'd, [...][1663 (indicated as 1664), [Samuel Butler], “The Second Part of Hudibras. Canto III.”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678...

Questions about don't count your chickens before they've hatched

What is don't count your chickens before they've hatched the alternative form of?
Don't count your chickens before they've hatched is the alternative form of don't count your chickens before they're hatched.

Words near don't count your chickens before they've hatched in the dictionary

  1. don't cha
  2. don't change a winning team
  3. don't count your chickens
  4. don't count your chickens before the eggs have hatched
  5. don't count your chickens before they're hatched
  6. don't count your chickens before they've hatched
  7. don't count your chicks
  8. don't count your chicks before they hatch
  9. don't count your chicks before they're hatched
  10. don't cry for me, Argentina
  11. don't cry over spilled milk

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: don't count your chickens before they've hatched (page history and authors); don't count your chickens before they're hatched (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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